STOP TAKING & START GIVING

Posted by Pastor Greg Allen on July 2, 2023 under 2023 |

Bethany Bible Church Sermon Message; July 2, 2023 from Ephesians 4:28

Theme: We are to cease all stealing, and work in order to meet the needs of others.

(All Scripture is taken from The New King James Version, unless otherwise indicated).

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“It is more blessed to give than to receive.”

That’s probably one of the best-known phrases in the world. Almost everyone has heard it … and almost everyone has quoted it at one time or another. But I suspect that most people don’t know who it is that first gave it to us.

It came from the lips of the Lord Jesus Christ. But when did He speak those words? Where do we find them in the Scriptures? They’re not found in any of the Gospels; in Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John—where we’d ordinarily expect to find the words of the Lord Jesus. Surprisingly, the only place we find them is in the twentieth Chapter Book of Acts. And that fact is significant.

You see; the apostle Paul was speaking to a group of pastors. He spoke of his own careful manner of living as he labored among them; and he said,

“I have coveted no one’s silver or gold or apparel. Yes, you yourselves know that these hands have provided for my necessities, and for those who were with me. I have shown you in every way, by laboring like this, that you must support the weak. And remember the words of the Lord Jesus, that He said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive’” (Acts 20:33-35).

In other words, that phrase isn’t found “recorded” in the Gospels. Instead, they were words from our Lord that—by the grace of the Holy Spirit—His followers “remembered” that He had said to them. And I appreciate what one great old preacher named Harry Ironside said about this: These must have been words that the Lord Jesus had repeated often in His teaching and in His earthly ministry; because they had already become very familiar to the people of God at the time that Paul quoted them. The idea that it is “more blessed to give than to receive” must have been something that was so characteristic of the Lord Jesus’ life and ministry and teaching that His early followers knew those words in a very familiar way. All that Paul had to say was, “And remember …”

And truly, it was indeed the blessedness of the Lord Jesus to give. No one ever gave more than He gave. As the apostle Paul once told his fellow believers in 2 Corinthians 8:9;

For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty might become rich (2 Corinthians 8:9).

The Son of God willingly set aside the majesty and riches He enjoyed in heavenly glory before His Father, came to this earth to be born as one of us, and to die on the cross to save us. We who had been lost in our sins and alienated from God are now made righteous in God’s sight by placing our faith in Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross for us. It’s by Jesus and His sacrifice for us that we are now brought into all the riches of heaven that Jesus Himself enjoyed before the Father. He who was immeasurably wealthy became deeply poor for us; so that we, through His humble poverty, might become fabulously rich with Him. No one ever gave more than Jesus.

And it was His joy to do so. It’s hard for us to imagine; but He, who had enjoyed such great bliss in eternal glory before His Father, willingly laid down those riches for a season in order to experience the even greater joy of giving Himself for us by dying on the cross. In Hebrews 12:2, it tells us this about Jesus; that He is …

the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God (Hebrews 12:2).

The “joy” that was set before Him, dear brothers and sisters—that anticipated blessedness that moved Him to set aside His glory for a while, and to endure the horrible shame of the cross—was the prospect of you and me being saved and enjoying heavenly glory with Him forever. No one—absolutely no one—ever gave more than Jesus gave for you and me! And no one was ever more blessed in the giving than He was!

And so; there is no greater example that we could ever find of what this means—“It is more blessed to give than to receive”—than in Jesus our Savior, Lord, and dearest Friend.

* * * * * * * * * *

Now, dear brothers and sisters; the reason I’ve ‘reminded’ you of all this today is because it gives us the best possible reference point from which to understand what we find in Ephesians 4:28. That’s where we read these words from the apostle Paul:

Let him who stole steal no longer, but rather let him labor, working with his hands what is good, that he may have something to give him who has need (Ephesians 4:28).

You remember the context of these words; don’t you? We’ve been studying Ephesians 4 for some time now. These words come from the description that the apostle Paul gives us of how our lives are to be transformed by faith in the cross of Jesus. In Ephesians 4:22-24, he wrote;

that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness (Ephesians 4:22-24).

Through our faith in Jesus, we are joined with Him in such a way as to have died with Him on the cross, and to have been raised with Him in His resurrection. If we’ve placed our faith in Jesus, we’ve been cleansed of our sins and are now ‘brand new creations’ before God in Him. The past is gone. All things are made new. And so; in keeping with who we now are, we are to ‘put off’ the old patterns and practices of our life of sin, become ‘renewed in the spirit of our mind’ through the word of God, and ‘put on’ the habits and practices of Jesus Himself ‘in true righteousness and holiness’.

As we have been studying this wonderful pattern for life transformation in Jesus, we’ve found that Paul went on to give us five specific examples of what this life transformation looks like. We find them in verses 25-32. He shows us—in five areas of daily living—what it looks like to ‘put off’ the old, to be renewed in our thinking, and to ‘put on’ the new. And one of those areas of life is what we find in verse 28. In reference to our old habits and practices of ‘stealing’, he writes, “Let him who stole steal no longer”—that’s what we’re to ‘put off’; “but rather let him labor, working with his hands what is good”—that’s what we’re to put on instead; “that he may have something to give him who has need”—and that’s how we’re to be renewed in our thinking.

And just think of it, dear brothers and sisters in Christ. We’re being called upon to do this while living—as we do every day—in the midst of a world that is practically given over to the practices of ‘stealing’ and ‘theft’. Everywhere we look, we see it going on. We hear about it on the news every day—with more and more businesses moving out of our area, or even closing down entirely, because of the pandemic of vandalism and theft; or of law enforcement becoming almost incapable of keeping up with the crimes, or of defending us against them; or of how people are losing their savings through some prowler on the Internet, and not even knowing it until their savings are gone. And we’re being called upon by God’s word to live distinctly different lives in the midst of this culture of theft! How can we do this? And what’s more, how can we keep from the temptations ourselves when everyone else, it seems, is doing it?

Well; the best way to do so—the best way to live a distinct life in this area—is to keep our eyes on Jesus! He perfectly models two important things for us when it comes to this whole matter of ‘stealing’. First of all, the main motivation for theft—the desire to take what belongs to someone else—is selfishness; and in Jesus, we see the complete absence of such selfishness. In Him, we see the richest Person in the universe selflessly giving everything up in order to make us rich. And the other thing we see in Him is the joy He experienced as a result of doing so. His joy wasn’t in taking. His joy was in giving. In Him—as the greatest example of them all—we see that it truly is more blessed to give than to receive.

By keeping our eyes upon our Redeemer, we see that—as His redeemed followers—we are now to cease all stealing, and work in order to meet the needs of others. He Himself transforms us and helps us to do so.

* * * * * * * * * *

So then; let’s look at this verse in closer detail. The first thing we see in verse 28 is that we are to …

1. ‘PUT OFF’ ALL FORMS OF STEALING.

The translation that I’m using has it, “Let him who stole steal no longer …”; as if the stealing was in the past tense. But I need to tell you that that’s not the best way to translate what Paul actually wrote. What he actually said was, “Let the ‘stealing’ person no longer steal.” In other words, he assumed that the person who was reading those words was actually—at that time—in the habit of stealing. It wasn’t something going on in the past; but was something that was happening right then … and that it needed to stop.

That, at first, might seem like something hard to imagine. He was, after all, writing to a community of believers. Could it actually have been that, as this letter was read—sitting there in the church family—there would have been ‘thieves’ and ‘robbers’? Well; that would seem hard to imagine if we only think of ‘stealing’ in its extreme forms—armed robbery; breaking and entering; grand theft; extortion; looting; blackmail; fraud; shoplifting; blatant forms of larceny … Those are acts of robbery that bring about criminal prosecution. They’re what we ordinarily think of as the sin of ‘stealing’. But those aren’t really the only forms of this sin; are they?

There are ‘every-day’ forms of theft that—while aren’t usually prosecuted by law—are nevertheless forms of ‘stealing’ in the eyes of a holy God: using someone else’s physical property without permission or remittance; taking and using someone’s intellectual property as if it was your own; lying on your time-card at work; quoting someone else’s material on a report without acknowledgment; failing to record a few things on our tax form; taking a few pencils and paperclips home from the office; using the copier or printer for personal matters without permission. Everyone does these kinds of things. For some people, it’s how they get by. For some, it’s even how they ‘pay the man back’. It’s the kind of theft that we rationalize by asking, ‘Who’s it going to hurt?’ or ‘Who’s going to know?’ or ‘It’s owed to me anyway’.

That’s why Paul wrote his words the way he did. He said, “Let the ‘stealing’ person no longer steal”; because, if we would sincerely allow the Holy Spirit to examine us, we’d find that there are many areas in our lives right now in which we are engaging in some form of stealing. And as followers of Jesus, it must now cease.

And it’s really no small thing; is it? It’s the eighth of the Ten Commandments from God:

“You shall not steal” (Exodus 20:15).

It doesn’t say, “You shall not steal in big ways.” It tells us that we must never do anything to take what does not belong to us, or to diminish anyone else’s ability to have or use what belongs to them. In fact, it is a sin that is so serious that—if made into a life-practice—it would keep someone out of heaven. The apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11;

Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God (2 Corinthians 6:9-11).

Look at the kind of company “thieves” keep in those words! And praise God that we can be washed, sanctified, and justified in the name of Jesus! Clearly, some had been thieves in the Corinthian church; but ‘were’ no longer. But we must make sure that—as Paul implies at the beginning of our verse today—that a ‘thief’ is not something that we still ‘are’ in any respect.

God does not want His people to be known for ‘stealing’ in any form. Paul wrote to Pastor Titus once; and told him to urge this upon the people under his care:

Exhort bondservants to be obedient to their own masters, to be well pleasing in all things, not answering back, not pilfering, but showing all good fidelity, that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in all things (Titus 2:9-10).

So, dear brothers and sisters; let’s ask the Holy Spirit to point out the practices in our lives that are dishonoring to our Lord in this area. Let’s ask Him to show us where we are ‘stealing’—even in ways that seem ‘acceptable’ in the eyes of this world, but that are displeasing to Him. If we’re stealing, let’s completely cease doing so. If we’ve taken anything that doesn’t belong to us, let’s return it and apologize for taking it. Let’s ask God’s help in completely ‘putting off’ from ourselves this old, sinful practice of ‘stealing’.

It’s not who we are any longer in Christ. It’s not like Him!

* * * * * * * * * *

But that’s not enough. It’s not enough that we merely stop stealing. It’s not enough that we merely return what we stole. That’s the first step … but it’s not the only step. We must not only ‘put off’ the old practices; but must also ‘put on’ the new. And this is where Paul teaches us to …

2. ‘PUT ON’ LABORING WITH OUR HANDS.

It may seem a bit simplistic to say; but the most common reason that people steal is because it’s the quickest way to obtain something they want without having to work for it. And what we’re to “put on” is the practice of faithful, productive labor. “Let him who stole steal no longer”, Paul tells us; “but rather let him labor, working with his hands what is good …”

Here again, it’s good to look at our Lord and Savior Jesus. If ever there was someone who should not have had to ‘work’ for what He wanted, it would have been Him. After all, He made all that there is. It’s already His. But in Mark 6:3, He’s called “the carpenter”. His adopted father Joseph was a carpenter; and apparently, He worked in the same craft. Carpentry is no easy work! But our Lord labored—’working with His hands what is good’ in order to earn what He needed. And as His followers—as much as it is in us to do so—we must do the same.

And so did the man who wrote the words of our verse this morning. The apostle Paul—one of the most brilliant scholars of all time—was no ‘delicate’ bookworm. He was able and willing to labor with his hands when he needed to. In 1 Corinthians 4:12; he wrote to his Corinthian brothers and sisters and showed them his integrity—and the integrity of his fellow ministers—by the things they suffered. And in listing them, he said,

And we labor, working with our own hands (1 Corinthians 4:12).

In speaking to those Ephesian pastors that we mentioned before—in Acts 20—he held out his hands to them. Those hands weren’t the soft hands of an idle philosopher or scholar. They could see that those hands were worn. He told them;

“… you yourselves know that these hands have provided for my necessities, and for those who were with me …” (Acts 20:34).

Paul didn’t ‘steal’. He didn’t find some way to get what he needed without working for it. He followed the Lord’s own example; and labored to earn what he needed. And dear brothers and sisters in Christ; that’s what you and I must do too. As he wrote in 1 Thessalonians 4:9-12;

But concerning brotherly love you have no need that I should write to you, for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another; and indeed you do so toward all the brethren who are in all Macedonia. But we urge you, brethren, that you increase more and more; that you also aspire to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business, and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you, that you may walk properly toward those who are outside, and that you may lack nothing (1 Thessalonians 4:9-12).

So then; we must ‘put off’ all forms of theft and stealing. But that alone is not enough. We must also ‘put on’ productive labor—working as faithfully as we are able with the strengths and skills and talents that God has given us—to justly earn what we need. Let’s ask God to help us see where we need to be more faithful in the area of productive labor—working on what is good with our own hands.

And think of it! If everyone faithfully ‘put on’ this second thing, there would be a lot less need to ‘put off’ the first thing.

* * * * * * * * * *

But if we just ‘put off’ stealing, and ‘put on’ productive labor, even that is still not enough. That would place us in conformity with God’s commandment. But God calls to an even higher standard than just that. He calls us to walk in the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ; who selflessly gave in order to enrich others—who, in our case, became poor for us so that we might become rich with Him.

And this leads us to that third element that is always involved in this three-fold pattern of life-transformation that Paul has been setting before us in Ephesians 4. Between ‘putting off’ the old man and ‘putting on’ the new, there must be a ‘renewing of the spirit of our minds’. We must let God’s word transform our thinking; so that our actions come from a genuinely transformed heart.

And so; last of all, Paul urges us to …

3. ASPIRE TO ‘HAVE’ IN ORDER TO ‘GIVE’.

He wrote, “Let him who stole steal no longer, but rather let him labor, working with his hands what is good …” And why? Is it just so that he will have what he needed, and be able to take care of his own concerns, and leave it at that? No! It’s so “that he may have something to give him who has need.”

My wife and I had a chance to visit a dear friend not long ago. This friend is looking ahead to the possibility of semi-retirement. They’re in a position right now of having just the right amount of income coming in—just as much as is needed—to be able to live a comfortable life. They could cease working if they wanted to. But they told us that they want to keep on working—even if it’s just part-time—because this will provide them with something extra to give to others who are in need. They love Jesus; and they find great joy in being able to give to others. And that, I believe, is the true spirit of what Paul is talking about.

There is joy in having enough to give to the needs of others. It’s a joy that truly pleases our Lord. It’s worth working and laboring for. Paul once wrote the Corinthian believers about a great donation they had gathered up to help meet the needs of others in trouble. He praised God for it and wrote;

Now may He who supplies seed to the sower, and bread for food, supply and multiply the seed you have sown and increase the fruits of your righteousness, while you are enriched in everything for all liberality, which causes thanksgiving through us to God. For the administration of this service not only supplies the needs of the saints, but also is abounding through many thanksgivings to God, while, through the proof of this ministry, they glorify God for the obedience of your confession to the gospel of Christ, and for your liberal sharing with them and all men, and by their prayer for you, who long for you because of the exceeding grace of God in you. Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift! (2 Corinthians 9:10-15).

And brothers and sisters in Christ; that’s a gift that we should also seek. It’s not enough, you see, to cease all forms of stealing. That’s something that we should ‘put off’ completely—and right away. But it’s still not enough to then labor productively with our own hands to meet our needs. That’s the thing we should ‘put on’; but that alone doesn’t cause us to be following in the footsteps of our Lord Jesus. We should labor in order to be able to have enough to then do good to others, and to help relieve their need. That’s as far away from ‘stealing’ and ‘theft’ as we can get. And best of all, it’s how we behave like our Lord.

* * * * * * * * * *

Our Lord said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive.” He proved it by His own life. And now, as His followers, let’s embrace—in the power of the Holy Spirit—what Paul has urged us to do: “Let him who stole steal no longer, but rather let him labor, working with his hands what is good, that he may have something to give him who has need.”

AE